


life expectancy

by futuresoon



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Angst, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Thinking About Death, but not really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:07:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24112528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/futuresoon/pseuds/futuresoon
Summary: It's remarkably dull, knowing you aren't real.
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira, Akechi Goro/Persona 5 Protagonist
Comments: 19
Kudos: 500





	life expectancy

It’s remarkably dull, knowing you aren’t real.

In truth, Akechi’s suspected he isn’t much of a person for quite some time. Since adolescence, at least, and possibly earlier. But that’s a separate issue. The issue at hand is this: he’s missing some very important memories, and some of the ones he does have line up too neatly with a world partially designed to make Akira Kurusu happy, and most days he looks in the mirror and thinks _I’ve been dead for a while_ and it sounds about right.

So. He isn’t real. He hasn’t confirmed it yet, not while Maruki’s still making them wait until the last possible second, but it seems pretty likely. He’s an illusion created to make Kurusu feel like he can save everyone after all. It’s always about Kurusu in the end, isn’t it.

Akechi hasn’t decided yet when he’s going to tell Kurusu about it. Maybe he won’t at all. Maybe he’ll blink out of existence when nobody’s looking, and they’ll wonder where he went, but they won’t really care. Kurusu might take longer to forget him. Or he might not.

Regardless, going through the world knowing he’s going to disappear soon isn’t nearly as frightening as it seems. He never expected to live particularly long, wasn’t even surprised when the end came in Shido’s Palace, and now he knows the exact day and circumstances. What good would fear do? Instead, he walks through the streets of Tokyo thinking, _It probably won’t even hurt. Most people don’t get that. I’m lucky, really._

He’s lucky, he tells himself, staring at the walls of his quiet apartment, wondering if he technically has a soul, and if anything will happen to him afterwards. If whatever cosmic force governs that sort of thing decides one Goro Akechi was enough and the ripoff should just completely cease to be. Not that he thought much about an afterlife before--but theology seems much more possible lately, and no theology he knows of has a place for things like him.

He goes to school, generally, because he doesn’t have much else to do in the daytime unless Kurusu decides to summon the whole little gang. Everyone’s as happy there as they are everywhere, which he would normally find annoying, but he just can’t muster up the energy to care. It’s not clear whether his old job is simply defunct or never existed in the first place, but either way, the only detective work he has is simple little things he’s not even needed for. So most of his time, really, days and nights, is spent doing nothing particularly interesting.

Akechi just…exists, really. Which is funny, because he doesn’t. He drifts through the life Maruki thought would please a dead person, and that’s all.

When Kurusu _does_ call everyone together, though…well.

It’s hard to say that he feels _alive_ in battle, per se, because he isn’t. But he feels _something._ The thrill of combat and black blood dripping from Loki’s claws and showing all these children what he was _really_ like is fire in his veins. A fire that dies too quickly, leaves him restless until the next battle. 

Early on, when it’s just him and Kurusu, Kurusu pulls him aside into a safe room and says, “Are you feeling okay? Is the breakdown still happening?” And it takes Akechi a solid second before he realizes Kurusu wants to believe there’s a supernatural explanation and he isn’t just _like this._

Akechi gives a very dry smile. “Who knows,” he says. “Am I making you uncomfortable?”

“I just want to be sure you’re okay,” Kurusu says, shaking his head. “I know you’ve dropped the detective front, but you weren’t acting like this outside the Palace.”

“Surely you know by now that acting is what I _do,”_ Akechi says airily. He gestures towards the door. “Perhaps the version of me you see here is the real one, and everything outside is the act.”

Foolish, beautiful Kurusu frowns and says, “I don’t think that’s true. I mean, I don’t know all that much about you, really, but I didn’t get the impression you were this… _enthusiastic_ about what you did.”

Akechi’s smile could freeze a volcano. “You’re right,” he says. “You don’t know me at all.”

Sometimes when he looks at Kurusu he wants to grab his shoulders and shake him and snarl, _I’m only here because you think you can save me but you’re wrong, you never could have, and when you return to your normal life and realize that I’m not there you’ll finally understand your heroism has its limits. You can save the whole world but you can’t save me. I am the one thing you can never have._

So maybe Akechi feels things outside of combat after all.

A few nights, Kurusu invites him to the jazz club. Akechi would normally have called it a waste of time, but they’ve done all they can before the deadline and he doesn’t have much time left, so he doesn’t mind spending it like this. Soft music in the background. A drink that tastes refreshing even to illusory tastebuds. A boy who seeks out his company despite the myriad reasons not to, and looks beautiful under the club’s mood lighting, or any lighting, really. 

_I used to consider trying to seduce you,_ Akechi thinks. _I didn’t, in the end, couldn’t quite tell if you were receptive or just incapable of turning down invitations. Would you be now? Even if you were, how much can this form feel? The table, the drink, my sword, yes, but anything less tangible than that? Can something that isn’t a person feel another person that way? Could I appreciate you at all?_

“You’re awfully quiet,” Kurusu observes. “What’s on your mind?”

“Murder,” Akechi says flatly, and Kurusu laughs, and takes another drink.

Kurusu is absurd. Absurd and unfair and probably going to be sad when Akechi disappears, which is even more absurd. Akechi really should just rip that bandaid off and tell him. Really maximize on that misery.

Akechi’s all out of other ways to win against Kurusu. Killing him didn’t work, fighting him didn’t work, maybe the only thing he has left is emotional warfare. _You insist on caring about me? Fine. I’ll watch you tear yourself apart trying to help something that’s beyond your reach. You’ll be sad about me forever and if that’s the only way I can hurt you then I’ll dig my fingers into your bleeding heart and you’ll never forget that twice over you couldn’t save me._

But Kurusu’s eyes are bright and for something that isn’t a person Akechi’s feeling awfully indulgent, so instead he says something inane about jazz and Kurusu eats it up like it’s the most fascinating thing he’s heard all day.

\---

Akechi thinks of so many scenarios for telling or not telling Kurusu. Very dramatic, very poignant. Then Maruki goes and does it himself. Akechi never gets to have anything.

What Akechi never thought of is the ridiculous proposition Maruki makes--Kurusu _already_ chose the old world, he’s not going to rethink his entire stance on the nature of human suffering because of one person. Kurusu’s smart, and stubborn as hell, and _painfully_ committed to his principles. It’s not happening.

Kurusu looks like his dog died. Fuck off.

Akechi makes his stance on the matter very clear, and Kurusu seems to get it. He’s not happy, but he gets it. Akechi turns to leave, almost makes it to the door, when a hand closes on his wrist and Kurusu says, “Wait,” a little quietly.

Akechi turns around. “What _is it,_ Kurusu,” he says, and puts the weight of his frustration into the words.

“Do you…” Kurusu seems to have a hard time saying it. “Do you _want_ to disappear?” he eventually asks.

Oh, he’s not even going to ask anything interesting. “I’ve come to terms with it,” Akechi says. 

Kurusu’s all wounded-puppy eyes. “That’s not what I asked,” he says softly.

“Frankly, that isn’t any of your business,” Akechi says. His thoughts on…all of that are his own, not something for an overbearing altruist to pick through and pretend to understand. “Neither of us can do anything about it, so it doesn’t matter. Let go of me.”

“It _does_ matter,” Kurusu insists, and doesn’t let go. “Your life _matters,_ Akechi.”

“I’m not alive, and neither is he,” Akechi says. He tells himself that it’s enjoyable to see Kurusu go a bit pale at that. “Goro Akechi died in Shido’s Palace. I’m just a copy Maruki made because he thought you’d like it. I’m probably not even accurate to the original.”

Kurusu leans against the counter, but doesn’t let go, and laughs a little. Only a little. “Well, you’re a lot less nice to me than the first one was,” he says.

“And since I’m designed to make you happy, that says more about you than it does me,” Akechi snaps. He yanks on his arm. Kurusu doesn’t budge.

“I just…” Kurusu pushes up his glasses, rubs between his eyebrows. “I guess I did want a version of you I could save,” he says, his voice heavy. “But I can’t even have that, huh.”

Oh that is _rich_ coming from Kurusu. “My heart bleeds for you,” Akechi says drily. “Fuck off.”

“…Wakaba and Okumura disappeared, though,” Kurusu says, a little slowly. “When Futaba and Haru realized they weren’t real. You’re still here.”

“Do you really think I haven’t thought of that?” Akechi asks. “God, don’t look so _hopeful._ All of this is cognitive psience bullshit anyway. Maybe it’s because your cognition is stronger than theirs. Maybe Maruki designed me that way. Maybe I just hate you _that much._ Let _go,_ Kurusu.”

Finally, Kurusu releases his hold on Akechi’s wrist. “I’m missing something,” he says. “I don’t think he was telling the truth. Or maybe he didn’t know the truth. But I really feel like there’s more to it than what he said, and don’t you _want_ that?”

Akechi could say something about how he’s used to not getting what he wants. But he’s not in favor of a return of the wounded-puppy eyes. “I want to go back to my apartment and deal with my impending nonexistence by myself,” he says. “Give it up, Joker. Not everything is about you.”

Kurusu doesn’t look like he’s giving up. “Okay,” he says. “If that’s what you want. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Akechi doesn’t say goodbye again. He just leaves.

\---

For the last battle of Akechi’s non-life, the fight against Maruki is pretty good.

Hereward gets to sink his claws in. Akechi gets to feel his energy run deliciously dry, like aching muscles in a workout that stops just short of collapse, and the exhilaration of it all fills up his veins like liquid metal. Kurusu shouts orders left and right, and Akechi mostly obeys them. 

It’s strange. Akechi’s used to fighting for his life. This Palace is the first time he’s ever fought to die.

And the last, presumably.

The fight almost seems to end badly, but of course everything _is_ about Kurusu and the universe loves its golden boy. Everyone stumbles out of the ridiculous helicopter while Maruki’s Palace cracks like glass behind them.

It’s strange.

Akechi can’t tell if anything feels off. The Palace isn’t quite destroyed yet. They’re not fully out of the Metaverse. There’s still a few moments left, probably, before...what happens.

Kurusu straightens up and looks at him. The mask is gone, leaving Kurusu’s face bare, pale and worried and still so beautiful.

Is that the last thing this not-a-person will see?

Akechi might not mind that.

Kurusu’s saying something, but Akechi can’t tell what it is.

Kurusu steps forward, reaches his hand out.

The Metaverse shatters.

Akechi feels _something_ happening inside him, a strange, cascading feeling like sand pouring through a broken hourglass, but even through the cracks in the world he can still see Kurusu running towards him, reaching for him--

His fingers twitch upwards--

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at [Tumblr](http://www.futuresoon.tumblr.com) and [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/futuresoonest).


End file.
